CHICAGO, NOV. 20 -- What was known immediately about the murders of Deborah Evans and two of her children was horrible enough. The 28-year-old woman, who was nine months' pregnant, was found shot in the head and stabbed early Friday morning in her apartment in the Chicago suburb of Addison.
Evans's 10-year-old daughter, Samantha, was found stabbed to death in a bedroom of the apartment. A few hours later, police located the body of Evans's 8-year-old son, Joshua, in an alley in the nearby suburb of Maywood. Police said he had been taken from the apartment alive and stabbed to death later.
But over the weekend, the brutal crime became a tale of the bizarre with the disclosure by law enforcement authorities that Evans's full-term baby boy, whom she had decided to name Elijah, had been crudely cut from her womb and abducted, allegedly by the three people who have been charged in the slayings.
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According to authorities, the suspects may have committed the murders in order to get the baby because two of them -- a man and a woman -- wanted a son. The third suspect may be the father of the baby, they said. The suspects cleaned up the baby, crudely cut the umbilical cord and dressed him in baby clothes.
The baby, who weighs 6 pounds, 8 ounces and is now in the legal custody of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services, was reported to be in good condition at a local hospital. Meanwhile, the three suspects appeared before a DuPage County judge today and were ordered held without bond.
Police identified the suspects as Jacqueline Annette Williams, 28, her boyfriend, Fedell Caffey, 22, and her cousin, Laverne Ward, a 24-year-old ex-convict.
They were charged with murder and kidnapping. Prosecutors said they will seek the death penalty in the case.
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According to police, Ward is the father of another of Evans's children, a 19-month-old boy named Jordan, who was found frightened but unharmed in the bloody apartment where his mother and half sister were murdered.
That connection, and the fact that the boy survived the carnage in the apartment, led police to begin questioning Ward soon after the bodies were discovered. Police said the boy was being cared for by relatives.
The bodies were found by Evans's current boyfriend, James Edwards, who was also being held by police on warrants unrelated to this case.
As they were being led away to the DuPage County jail, Caffey and Ward maintained their innocence. "They're framing us and we want somebody to do something about it!" Ward shouted to onlookers.
But Joseph Birkett, chief of criminal prosecution for the DuPage County states attorney's office, said that Williams had given prosecutors a detailed statement and had implicated the others in the crime. "The allegation is that Fedell Caffey did the shooting and that both Fedell Caffey and Vern Ward participated in the stabbing and the removal of the child from Deborah's stomach," Birkett said.
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At today's court hearing, prosecutors said Williams, who reportedly has had some nurse's training, helped remove and revive the baby. They said the baby was ripped from Evans's womb "at or about the time of her death."
"Fedell Caffey and Williams wanted to have a son," Birkett said. "Williams was aware that Deborah Evans was pregnant and that it was a boy."
Birkett said prosecutors have received unconfirmed reports that Ward may also be the father of the baby. He said this would be determined by genetic testing.
When reports that the baby had survived the murder first surfaced, prosecutors said the case did not involve devil worship or other cult activity but was a carefully planned crime that included the abduction of the unborn child.
"The allegation is that they went in there and they acted deliberately in killing Deborah and Samantha and in taking that child from the womb," Birkett said after the arraignment of the suspects today.
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The Chicago Sun-Times quoted a neighbor of Williams, Laura Eimer, as saying that Williams told her last month that she was 8 1/2 months' pregnant, a time that would closely parallel the term of Evans's pregnancy.
Williams apparently knew Evans through Ward, her cousin and Evans's former boyfriend.
The Chicago Tribune reported that Caffey strongly wanted a child, but for reasons that were unclear could not have one with Williams, the mother of three children.
The father of Evans's two dead children, Samantha and Joshua, reportedly lives in Florida. CAPTION: Suspect Laverne Ward fathered the toddler whose life was spared. CAPTION: Deborah Evans, her daughter Samantha, 10, and son Joshua, 8, were killed. Her 19-month-old son, Jordan, survived; his father is a suspect. CAPTION: Jacqueline Annette Williams allegedly wanted a son desperately.
